


Fallen Angel

by leiascully



Series: The FBI's Most Unwanted [12]
Category: The X-Files
Genre: Alien Abduction, Episode Tag, Gen, Medication, Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-25
Updated: 2015-06-25
Packaged: 2018-04-06 01:42:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4203177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leiascully/pseuds/leiascully
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"This isn't like Samantha's abduction, Mulder."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fallen Angel

**Author's Note:**

> Timeline: 1.10 "Fallen Angel"  
> A/N: How I never really paid attention to the parallels between Max's abduction and Samantha's before this, I'll never know.  
> Disclaimer: _The X-Files_ and all related characters are the property of Chris Carter, 1013 Productions, and Fox Studios. No profit is made from this and no infringement is intended.

Against his protests, Scully took Mulder to the hospital, facing down Henderson and the rest. Mulder limped to the car as she snapped at the soldiers, holding them off. Mulder shot his chair back on its rails and stretched out his leg as Scully got into the driver's seat, still glaring at the impassive soldiers.

"He's gone, Scully," he said. "Max. There was a light, and some kind of creature, and he's gone."

"Mulder, shh," she said, gazing at the road. "I think it's probably just a sprain, but your leg might be broken."

"They took him," he told her. "Or they let him be taken."

"Maybe they did," she said, "but there's nothing we can do about it now. Colonel Henderson has that site locked down. Our access was gone anyway."

"I told them I wouldn't let them take him," he said, and then subsided into broody silence. Pain creased his forehead. He leaned on her as they hobbled into the hospital like a three-legged race. It felt like a metaphor. The two of them, bound to each other. The only way to progress was compromise. Between the two of them, she mused, they might cobble together one reasonable imitation of a life. She bullied the ER doctors into a quick X-ray while Mulder leaned against the wall, wincing. 

"There's no fracture," Dr. Oppenheim said, coming into the room. "Just a bad sprain."

"Great," Mulder said. "What's it going to take to get out of here?"

"I'll give you some crutches and something for the pain," Oppenheim told him, and then looked at Scully. "Keep him off it for at least a week if possible."

She tried to smile, but knew it came out a little too wry. "I'll do my best. Where's the quickest place to get the crutches? We've got a flight in a few hours."

"They should have a pair in the pharmacy," Oppenheimer said. "Tell them I said to take care of you as fast as possible." _We want you gone_ , he didn't say, but she heard it, along with his gratitude. She nodded. Mulder pushed himself off the wall and she slipped under his arm, bracing herself against the weight of him. There was a comfort, the familiar task of counterbalancing her partner.

They drove to the airport in silence. Mulder seemed to be drifting in and out of awareness, the pain meds putting him at some distance from his own thoughts. The flight attendants let them board early and upgraded them to seats in the half-empty first class. Scully helped Mulder settle himself next to the window. He gazed out at the tarmac, his eyes dull and shadowed. 

The pressure of taking off pinned them both to their seats. It was an excuse to lay her arm along Mulder's on the wide armrest. She wanted to take his pulse, but all she could feel was the timpani thud of her own heart. 

"It wasn't your fault," she offered, when they were in the air. She pitched her voice low, almost under the throaty buzz of the engines.

"Hmm?" he said, not looking away from the window.

Scully waved away the flight attendant. "Whatever happened to Max, Mulder, it wasn't your fault."

"I promised him, Scully," he said, squinting into the light above the clouds.

"This isn't…" she began, and faltered, foundering in the turbulence of the idea, and began again. "This isn't like Samantha's abduction, Mulder."

"Yeah," he said. "This time, I was already armed."

"There was nothing else you could have done," she said. "You protected him to the best of your ability. There were larger forces at work."

He huffed out a breath. "That doesn't make it any better, not when my best is clearly so woefully inadequate."

"You helped him," she told him. "Whatever else had happened to him in his life, you helped him."

"Not enough," he said.

She let the flight attendant bring her a cup of coffee and a bag of honey roasted peanuts. Mulder rested his head against the seat and slept, his face turned away from her. 

The medication was wearing off by the time they got back to D.C. She bought him a soda and made him take two more pills as they limped through the airport. He was still distant as she drove him home, but she refused to leave him until she was certain he would evade the trap of his guilty despair. She punched futilely at the pillows on his couch as he tried to navigate his apartment on the unaccustomed crutches. Finally he eased his restless body down, seeming to sink deeper into the cushions than usual. She made sure the remote, the crutches, and a glass of water were within easy reach. 

"Scully," he said as she was leaving. She turned, hand on the doorknob. "Thanks."

"Good night, Mulder," she said. "Call me if you need anything."

"Mm," he said, already miles away.

When she got home, she ran a bath, flinching away from the memory of Tooms, and wept into the hot water for Max and for the patients whose life had faded away under her hands as she'd rushed to soothe their burns and finally for Mulder, whose vows the universe saw fit to put asunder again and again.


End file.
